RHS Colour Chart editions reviewed

Horticultural Colour Chart 1 & 2, also known as the Wilson Colour Chart (Robert F. Wilson).
1939 & 1942. London; British Colour Council & Royal Horticultural Society; printed by Henry
Stone and Son, Ltd. (800 colour patches; each colour with a unique name; 5,000 copies printed).

RHS Colour Chart. 1966. London; RHS. First edition; green cardboard box, removable top. (792
colour patches; colours are no longer named but numbered; 7,000 copies printed). --
Accompanying the 1966 edition is a Table of Cross-References of the RHS Colour Chart to the
Horticultural Colour Chart (HCC), the British Colour Council Dictionary of Colour Standards
(BCC), the British Colour Council Dictionary of Colours for Interior Decorations (CC), the
Nickerson Color Fan (Nickerson), and the Commission Internationale de l’Eclairage or
International Commission on Illumination (CIE). The cross-references to the CIE are of
particular importance since the colors are expressed in co-ordinates obtained with a Hilger and
Watts J.40 Colourmeter, with check measurements made on a Beckman spectrophotometer.

RHS Colour Chart. 1986. London & Leiden; RHS & Flower Council of Holland. Second edition;
silver gray plastic box, fliptop. (808 colour patches; reprint of the 1966 edition, but some of the
colours, particularly in the red-purple hues, no longer match the 1966 ones).

RHS Colour Chart. 1995. London & Leiden; RHS & Flower Council of Holland. Third edition;
dark green plastic box, fliptop. (884 colour patches; a true reprint of the 1966 edition with 76
new colours that were previously hard to match, primarily dark purples, bright orange, bronze,
greys and greens).

RHS Colour Chart. 2001. London & Leiden; RHS & Flower Council of Holland. Fourth edition;
red and black plastic box, fliptop. (884 colour patches; identical to the 1966 and 1995 editions).

RHS Mini Colour Chart. 2005. London & Leiden; RHS & Flower Council of Holland. (one fan
with 244 colours, each one carefully chosen to represent the broad spectrum of colour found in
the full version; cardboard box; Price: £25).
[NOTE: Inadequate range of colours for Syringa. F.V.]

RHS Colour Chart. 2007. London; RHS. Fifth edition; green and black plastic box, fliptop. (896
colour patches on 224 cards with instructions in six languages, English, French, Dutch, German,
Russian & Japanese. Price £174.00.

RHS Colour Chart. 2015. London; RHS. Sixth edition; gray plastic fliptop box; 24 new colours
have been added; every colour now has an English name. The colours are arranged in four fans
with an instruction booklet in English, Dutch, French, German, Japanese and Spanish. Price
£199.00
for more information see:
<http://www.rhsshop.co.uk/productdetails.aspx?id=10000006&itemno=MARK0011>
or contact directly at: <mailorder@rhs.org.uk>
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Freek Vrugtman
updated February 18, 2016